


Liquid Space

by gardnerhill



Series: 221b Ficlets by Gardnerhill [4]
Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: 221B Ficlet, Community: watsons_woes, Diving, Gen, Prompt Fic, Retirement, Retirementlock, Sea Monsters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-03
Updated: 2014-08-03
Packaged: 2018-02-11 15:59:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2074242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gardnerhill/pseuds/gardnerhill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A retelling of “The Lion’s Mane.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Liquid Space

**Author's Note:**

> For the 2014 July Watson’s Woes Amnesty Prompt #4: **Stellar**. [The Crab Nebula](https://www.google.com/earth/explore/showcase/hubble20th.html#tab=crab-nebula). Use this however it inspires you.

_My God, it’s full of stars!_

That was my true and heartfelt impression, the first time I looked up from the ocean floor.

For years scientists had used glass-bottomed boxes with which to view the contents of a shore-pool and the like. My few forays into open-eyed viewing beneath the waves during my morning swim produced only a disappointing blue-green blur and stinging eyes. Some men had begun exploring the sea-bottom with enormous bubble-like helmets that gave them a tiny porthole upon which to gaze at the sea.

But I wanted something easier to use, in shallower waters so that I need not armour my head against water pressure. I fashioned a sort of glass-bottomed box, but shorter and to be fitted over my eyes like the tortoise-shell goggles used by pearl and sponge divers for centuries. After much trial and error (and all the time in which to conduct such trials), I finally perfected a device which leaked very little.

How do I describe that first moment, looking up through the water as if at the heavens? Tiny algal and animal particles shone in the sun like stars; fronds waved over me like lazy palms.

…And a deadly Lion’s Mane jellyfish looked like a nebula, seen from below.

I was almost reluctant to kill the beast, it was so beautiful.


End file.
